Design Report
The Downtown Dialogue : An Urban Living Room for All of Auckland

ReadWrite architecture has led to the discovery of the undesirable state of the present Downtown Shopping Centre, and the adjoining QEII Square. While the shopping mall itself is occupied with the banality of
lower-end shopping and an equally banal and outdated piece of architecture, the square is dark, windy
and underused.
A site of prominence in Auckland CBD should not be buried in mundane retail, overwhelming corporate
presences and lifelessness. This assertion led to the question of “what Auckland wants.”
Logically tackling the physical deficiencies of the site, it becomes clear that desirable qualities such as permeability, sunlight, view, and comfort should inform the speculative proposal of this site.
On another level, the current debate on the tension between public and private ownership of the space
makes the site, and its future, political. Already overshadowed and overwhelmed by corporate presence
(Zurich Building and HSBC Building), coupled with the unpopularity of QEII Square, the current usage of
the site is dominantly corporate. However, this does not mean the status-quo is adequate. As the centre
of Auckland’s transport hub, Central Business District, and fringing the trendy Britomart Precinct, this space
does not fulfil its civic functions. Or at the very least, blend in with the “success” of Britomart Precinct.

The square itself, is broken up by gardens, trees, water features, comfortable seating, platforms that implicitly extend the ground floors of interior spaces, and pathways that explicitly lead exterior space into interior
spaces. A giant series of steps lead down from Customs street, giving a sense of “arrival” to the space.
The Retail spaces to the Southwest of the square, have slanting forms with big open gesturing volumes
which welcomes pedestrians into the interior spaces, which are filled with pockets of “living spaces” – comfortable seating that extend the square.
Zurich Building is also speculatively “gutted” on the bottom level, to allow a difference podium to the building. The ground floor is permeable to the outside through a cross axes, and pockets of “living spaces” are
situated near the square.
The square as the heart of complex unites the cultural centre and eatery blocks, the retail blocks, and the
office block, by permeating pathways. The overall urban design presents interlocked interior and exterior
spaces, of mixed-use functions, which attempts to unite what is desirable about the public space, with the
utilitarian nature of commercial spaces.

However, not all things to do with capitalist intensions are bad. The city centre gains much of its identity from
economic activity. And for this purpose many come to the city centre.
This proposal seeks to tackle this tension by providing a complex which mixes the public with the private.
Where shops, eateries, and offices, as destination spaces for some, are sliced with pathways, pockets, and
a large square of public space.
The main rigour of the project comes from a diagonal slicing and dicing of the site. This strategy allows permeability within large blocks of commercial and office spaces. This permeability is important as it lets in both
pedestrians, views, and a sense of accessibility and intermingling between the different blocks of the complex. HSBC is sliced, to form the Harbour Avenues, where small blocks that consist of eateries and a cultural
centre, are interlinked with open pathways across each level. The Avenues welcome visitors and pedestrians into the heart of a lively square, through an interactive cultural centre. Equally, the “occupants” of the
complex are opened up to the harbour.